Biology

About the Author

Peter Raven

Peter H. Raven, Ph.D., is director of the Missouri Botanical Garden and Engelmann professor of botany at Washington University at St. Louis. He oversees the garden's internationally recognized research program in tropical botany--one of the world's most active in the study and conservation of imperiled tropical habitats. Raven's botanical research and work in the area of tropical conservation have earned him numerous honors and awards, including a MacArthur Fellowship. He has written 17 textbooks and more than 400 articles, and he is a member of th National Academy of Science and the National Research Council.

George Johnson

Dr. George B. Johnson is a researcher, educator, and author. Born in 1942 in Virginia, he went to college in New Hampshire (Dartmouth), attended graduate school in California (Stanford), and is Professor Emeritus of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis, where he has taught freshman biology and genetics to undergraduates for over 35 years. Also Professor of Genetics at Washington University’s School of Medicine, Dr. Johnson is a student of population genetics and evolution, authoring more than 50 scientific journal publications. His laboratory work is renowned for pioneering the study of previously undisclosed genetic variability. His field research has centered on alpine butterflies and flowers, much of it carried out in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and Wyoming. Other ecosystems he has explored in recent years include Brazilian and Costa Rican rain forests, the Florida Everglades, the seacoast of Maine, coral reefs off Belize, the ice fields and mountains of Patagonia, and, delightfully, vineyards in Tuscany.

A prolific writer and educator, Dr. Johnson is the author of seven nationally recognized college texts for McGraw-Hill, including the hugely successful majors texts Biology (with botanist Peter Raven) and three nonmajors’ texts: Understanding Biology, Essentials of The Living World, and  The Living World. He has also authored two widely used high school biology textbooks, Holt Biology and Biology: Visualizing Life. In the 30 years he has been authoring biology texts, over 3 million students have been taught from textbooks Dr. Johnson has written

Kenneth Mason

Kenneth A. Mason received his undergraduate degree in Molecular Biology from the University of Washington, worked at UC Berkeley, then pursued his PhD in Genetics at UC Davis. He has taught Gentics, Microbial Genetics, Microbiology, Advanced Molecular Genetics, Introductory Biology, and a Genetics Laboratory that he designed.

Jonathan Losos

Jonathan Losos is a Monique and Philip Lehner Professor for the Study of Latin America in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and Curator of Herpetology at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University. Losos's research has focused on studying patterns of adaptive ratiation and evolutionary diversification in lizards. The recipient of several awards including hte prestigious Theodosius Dobzhansky and David Starr Jordan Prizes for outstanding young evolutionary biologists, Losos has published more than 100 scientific articles.

Tod Duncan